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Aviation History
1969
1969 - 0839.PDF
FLIGHT International, 8 May 1969 745 THE EDWARDS REPORT THERE ARE ABOUT 300,000 words plus. 38 appendices in the report of the Edwards Committee, appointed in July 1967 by the President of the Board of Trade to enquire into the British air transport industry. Here we present the main recommendations, as listed at the end of each chapter of the report, together with Flight extracts from the body of the report We have rearranged the sequence of some chapters. This historic document was published on May 2 at a cost to the taxpayer of £43,285 and is obtainable from HM Stationery Office at £1 15s per copy. Principal recommendations The Committee regards the following as its principal proposals: — (1) The Government should promulgate, by statutory instrument from time to time as necessary, clear statements of civil aviation policy indicating the importance to be attached to the various objectives. (2) The primary long-term objective should be to satisfy the individual customer at the lowest price consistent with an economic return on the investment and a level of safety equal to the best in the world. Short-term policy must, however, reflect the country's urgent balance of payments problems. (3) British civil aviation in the 1970s should include a public sector, a mixed sector and a private sector. (4) The State Corporations should be confirmed in their role as the major operators of British scheduled air services and should also engage in inclusive tour and charter operations. The public sector should, however, be reorganised with a National Air Holdings Board having financial and policy control over BOAC and BEA. The objective would be to ensure the most effective deployment of operating facilities, marketing strength and traffic rights. (5) BOAC and BEA should retain their individual identities. There should be safeguards to avoid over-centralisation in the Holdings Board, a majority of whose members would also be on the boards of one of the Corporations or BAS. (6) BAS should be developed as a group of mixed owner ship regional airlines for domestic routes (excluding the trunk routes) with some continental connections. Some subsidy is justified for certain domestic routes on grounds of regional policy. The public investment would be held by the National Air Holdings Board. (7) The private sector should be encouraged to create a "second force" airline, which should be licensed to operate a viable network, covering scheduled and inclusive tour/charter traffic, both long-haul and short-haul. Where it is decided to license a second British operator on a route it should be this "second force" airline. It must be financially and managerially strong, should embrace more than one of the existing airlines and will probably take time to arrange. Viability will require some limited concession of Corporation territory. In exchange, and according to the size of the concession, the National Air Holdings Board should be entitled to take a financial stake in convertible loan stock or equity and also to appoint one or more directors to the "second force." (8) There will be room for other private airlines in inclusive tour and other passenger and freight charter operations where licensing and tariff regulation policies should be liberal. There will be increasing need for financial and managerial strength to maintain safe and efficient operations and we envisage fewer private airlines than the present number. (9) The private sector should be given a fair opportunity; no one should be forced to sell out to the State, equally no one should be bought out at more than true worth. (10) Good staff relations are essential to morale, efficiency and safety, and recommendations are made for improvements. The Government statements of policy should constitute the terms of reference of a new statutory Civil Aviation Authority. This Authority would be responsible for the economic- and British Air Transport in the Seventies Report of the Committee of Inquiry into Civil Air Transport Chairman Professor Sir Ronald Edwards KBE Prtxnted to Parliament by the President of the Board of Trade by Command of Her Ma)esty i Mar IrW LONDON HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE £1 IS*. M. Ml Onnd.WB safety regulatory functions at present dispersed between the ATLB, the Board of Trade and the ARB. It should also be responsible for the civil side of the joint National Air Traffic Control Services, for operational research, for long-term airport planning and for the main work of traffic rights negotiation. The air transport business is changing substantially and rapidly. Holiday and personal travel is becoming increasingly important; the patterns of traffic and operating techniques will also continue to change. This will call for reappraisal of the roles of scheduled and non-scheduled operations and of pricing and of price control. The Civil Aviation Authority should use its influence in favour of flexibility and experiment. Com petition should be regulated to the extent necessary to achieve the purposes of public policy, within the institutional and inter national framework. The financial and managerial resources of airlines should be thoroughly probed and monitored by the Authority on grounds inter alia of stability and safety. A commentary In the course of our investigations we have travelled widely to visit major airlines, Governments and independent authorities who have all shown a lively and helpful interest in our inquiry. Most of the problems that we have found difficult are also found difficult in other countries. We have therefore brought back no talisman; indeed had it been possible for us to do so it would have been a black mark against the British civil aviation authorities and the airline industry. The airline business is highly international; news travels fast. If there were valuable tips to be picked up they were unlikely to be left lying around waiting for the Edwards Committee. We have become aware of three factors which added to the difficulty of this inquiry. First, the rate of growth of air transport has often been underestimated, and some of the major developments have not been foreseen. There is no reason to suppose that we in our turn will be more prescient than others have been in the past. Certainly we think it would be unwise to base proposals on such an assumption. We have therefore sought to avoid recommendations that would make for rigidity; indeed we aim at flexibility, both of organisation. and attitudes.
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